A study in contrasts

Rebecca Keillor, Vancouver Sun11.06.2015

The interior of Pole Pass cabin on Orcas Island. ‘Trying to figure out the line between that outside context and that inside context ... is ultimately architecture,’ says designer Tom Kundig.Benjamin Benschneider

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Designing buildings that disappear into the local landscape, be it fields or high rises, is what architect Tom Kundig, principal and owner of Seattle’s Olson Kundig, considers success.

Nineteen examples of his residential, commercial and public projects that reflect this approach, along with sketches and conversations with clients and colleagues, are featured in his third book published with Princeton Architectural Press — Tom Kundig: Works.

“Whether it’s an urban centre, or large landscape, or somewhere in between, if you’re really doing architecture I think you’re observing the contextual forces of where you’re doing that project,” Kundig says. “So climatic of course, the landscape, the culture. All the forces on the outside — kind of pushing — have an effect on the outside of the building.”

This is equally true of the inside, he says, where contextual forces such as the client’s needs are at play.

“Trying to figure out the line between that outside context and that inside context and how you manipulate that line between the two I think is ultimately architecture,” he says. “If you’re really being truthful to that it is going to disappear into that larger context.”

Over his 30-plus-year career, Kundig has received a National Design Award from the Smithsonian Cooper Hewitt National Design Museum, an Academy Award in Architecture from the American Academy of Arts and Letters and last year was included in Architectural Digest’s AD100.

The sense of quiet, warmth and tranquillity in the projects in Works, from the Studhorse residence in Winthrop, Washington to the Pole Pass Cabin on Washington’s Orcas Island and an Upper East Side residence, all speak to the Kundig’s unique style of modern architecture.

“I think people are beginning to realize modern architecture done well is in fact an architecture of a place, time and landscape and if you meet all of that naturally with the materials, the outlooks and inlooks and everything that goes into experiencing a building, buildings do really become very personal, very human and not cold at all,” he says.

Kundig is working on projects in Rio de Janeiro, Geneva and Sydney and says West Coast architecture has found global appeal.

“The West Coast has this more open, relaxed, somewhat casual, lifestyle which I think — and this is my guess, I’m not sure if it’s true — is becoming globally accepted as the lifestyle of the future,” he says.

In the book’s introduction, design writer and editor Pilar Viladas quotes Kundig as saying “the tough and the soft have always been a part of my life.” This balance, evident in his projects in Works, was learned from his early years as a serious mountain climber, he says; experiencing both extreme comfort and peace and the exact opposite.

“In order to understand hard you have to understand soft and to understand soft you have to understand hard,” he says. “And when you bring those two together, you really have a full experience of what we used to call full condition. I always say in order to see black you have to see white. There’s all those extremes that reinforce each other.”

In line with Kundig’s practical reputation, his firm recently released a line of hardware — the Tom Kundig Collection — in collaboration with Seattle’s 12th Avenue Iron that includes door handles, hinges and door pulls to provide the products he and his colleagues often look for and can’t find.

“With this, my first foray into product design, I’m very happy to be making some of our work more affordable and widely available to people,” he says in the book.

When asked if there are any projects that stand out as career highlights for him, Kundig says:

“I really do think that my single favourite project is basically my career. It’s been long, it’s been interesting, it’s been just fantastic. To work with these clients and work with these landscapes and different cultures, I couldn’t be luckier to be involved in this world and the people I’ve met and the things I’ve been able to work on. I pinch myself.”

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